gt it really depends on the mechanism of the poll itself if i go to rural mississippi i can paint the picture that all americans still say nigger instead of african americans thats what my comment was addressing i havent seen this muchtalkedabout poll about rational muslims so i shouldnt comment on its sampling methods that said youre right that wed be looking at a certain population muslim religious rational however you define that but that doesnt mean we toss out random sampling as a goal we wouldnt want to for instance go to one mosque and apply their answers to an entire city country or regions larger population even within narrowly defined populations its best to aim for randomness edit my initial comment wasnt very helpful